Sessions at SXSW Interactive 2012 about humanity and Privacy and Censorship on Sunday 11th March

The digital age has eternalized information that was once fleeting, and the Right to be Forgotten has gained traction in the EU. A controversial aspect of these rights is that truthful, newsworthy information residing online may be removed after a certain amount of time in an attempt to make the information private again.

Two compelling camps have arisen: Preservationists and Deletionists. Preservationists believe the web offers the most comprehensive history of humanity ever collected and feel a duty to protect digital legacies without censorship. Deletionists argue that the web must learn to forget in order to preserve vital societal values and that threats to the dignity and privacy of individuals will create an oppressive networked space.

The US, the land of opportunity, has not embraced the Right to be Forgotten, but should it? The First Amendment raises significant issues, but how does the value of protected information changes over time. Could privacy ever outweigh expression?